John Murphy (contractor)

John Murphy (5 October 1913 – 7 May 2009) was an Irish business man who established the construction and infrastructure contractor J. Murphy & Sons. The company, based in Kentish Town, with its green vans and lorries, works on building sites across the UK and Ireland.^[1] His late brother Joe also went into construction in London, trading as Murphy Ltd and using grey vehicles,^[2] but that company went into administration and closed in 2013.^[3]

Murphy was born at Loughmark, near Cahersiveen, County Kerry. He left school at 15 but found work hard to come by. He travelled to London and started up as a subcontractor in the building trade. The Second World War offered him a golden opportunity. New airfields were urgently needed and later on runway repairs were needed also.^[4] He was successful in providing this service and at end of the war was well placed to help with large-scale reconstruction. Other ventures included electrification, cable installation, water facilities and road-building.^{[citation needed]}

At his death in 2009, his worth was estimated at £190 million.^[5] He valued his privacy and was known to spend little on luxuries, instead preferring to spend time with his own workmen and other Irish friends.^[1]

In the 1970s a specialist division of the company worked on the development of natural gas.^[6] Later projects included the Stansted Airport Rail Link, work in the City of London, the Channel Tunnel Rail Link and London's Olympic Park.^[7]

In 2007 J Murphy and Sons generated nearly £500 million of revenue and made pre-tax profits of £60 million. It was appointed lead contractor in the £125 million Liverpool-Manchester water pipeline project, which is to carry up to 100 million litres of water per day.^[4]

After Murphy's death in May 2009, leadership of the company passed initially to his daughter Caroline, who had been appointed deputy chairperson of the group in 2007.^[8] She later planned to turn the business into a worker's Co-op owned by its 3,500 employees, but other board members — notably her mother, brother and half-brother — resisted, and she resigned in 2014.^[8]

The company was then led by Steve Hollingshead until the appointment in 2017 of John Murphy's grandson, John B Murphy.^[9]

In the year to 31 December 2017 the company made a pre-tax profit of £12.43m from a turnover of £711m, and had 3,878 employees. In 2018, it experienced a slow down in growth, and cancelled its Christmas Party as part of a cost-cutting drive affecting jobs across the business.^[10]